Presently, when one or more air bags are provided in an automobile, the air bag may be stored in a steering wheel, in a seat bottom side or seat back side or door panel, or in an instrument panel of the vehicle. During automatic inflation of the air bag, at least a portion of the air bag cover moves away from the air bag container to permit the air bag to perform its safety function between its container and the occupant of the vehicle.
A recent practice in the automotive industry is utilization of all plastic fabricated air bag covers. Conventional air bag covers used in conjunction with occupant restraint systems often include various connection systems for attaching the air bag cover to the air bag container.
The U.S. Pat. No. 5,062,661 to Winget, discloses a rigid plate attached to a substantially rigid remainder of a front panel of an air bag cover to define a hollow compartment which, together, move upon manual actuation of a flexible manually operable diaphragm at the front surface of the front panel. Upon separation from the side panel, the front panel, including the diaphram, the hollow compartment, and a rigid plate move together to permit the inflating air bag to leave the cover. The front panel has a first electrically conductive inner surface for making a circuit path with a corresponding second electrically connected inner surface of the rigid plate.
Presently, sensors are used to determine if a vehicle passenger seat is unoccupied or if it has a child car seat disposed thereon for preventing deployment of a passenger air bag if either of these conditions is sensed. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,118,134 discloses an air bag controlling sensor arrangement for determining seat occupancy and position of a seat occupant, sensors preferably being mounted in the dash.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,071,160; 5,232,243; 5,366,241; 5,398,185; and 5,400,487 all disclose passenger seat detecting and position determining sensors for controlling passive restraint systems in vehicles such as air bags.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,834,420 discloses an air bag equipped child car seat.